Chapter Text
Clint sat on the edge of Tony’s workshop table as footage from the warehouse played. Steve had called in an ‘Avengers Assemble’, meaning every available member was here, Thor, Clint, Tony, Bruce, Steve, and Peter. Clint mourned the loss of Natasha at his side, and Steve was clearly missing Bucky. The last report from them said they would be returning in a few days, but that was a few days too long in Clint's opinion.
Clint refocused on the large holographic display that was replaying a specific moment where the man dodged a bullet aimed at his back, then turned and punched the guy who shot at him with such force a tooth flew through the air. The man’s face, what they could see of it anyway, was a display of bared teeth and tight jaw muscles.
Clint saw Bruce shift from the corner of his eye. Clint guessed he knew what it felt like.
Steve finally paused the video and the hologram stopped right as the man’s fist collided with the shooter's jaw.
“From what me and Clint saw,” Steve said, using his Captain America voice and, hilariously to Clint, a pointing stick, “and from what we could scrape together from the spy camera, the thing fought like that the entire night. When we checked the bodies none of them were dead, but all of them had suffered serious injury, including broken bones, bruised organs, dislocated joints, and notably one… well I don’t know the medical term for it so lets just say, ‘Reversed Elbow’.”
Everyone in the room shivered.
Steve continued, “It was able to fight in complete darkness, predicted bullets, moved almost completely silently, and spoke at least three languages fluently enough to mimic a perfect accent.”
Steve put down the stick, “Finally, the mobsters seemed to recognize or at least know of it. One asked to repent, and the other,” Steve took a breath, “called it ‘diablo’.”
Clint heard various intakes of breath from around the room.
Thor raised a hand, “Ah, pray tell, what does that mean in your midgardian language?”
“Devil,” Tony said flatly from where he was leaning against a table.
“Ah.”
“The way he spoke gets me more than anything,” Clint said.
Thor tilted his head like a big dog, “In which language?”
”All of them,” Clint gestured to the hologram. “We’ve seen plenty of enhanced people before, even some that could dodge bullets.”
”We have?” Thor asked.
”No,” Tony said, not looking up from the strange device he was holding, “Clint just likes to make us normies feel inadequate.”
Clint scoffed, “I think I’m more normal than you.”
”Your eyesight is just as good as a super soldier's, if not better,” Tony pointed out, “I just used a hunk of metal to not die.” He tapped the hollow of his chest.
”Back to the point,” Bruce said from where he sat, a notebook in hand. “What got to you about how he spoke?”
”Everything the diablo said was about sin. Pride, being cleansed, people being sinners.” Clint looked around. “He said he could smell someone’s sins.”
The room paused. Tony finally looked up from his work, Bruce’s leg stopped tapping, Thor set down his hammer.
Peter, who was sitting on the ceiling fiddling with some device that he kept dropping and catching with his webs, whispered, “I can’t even smell sins…“
“It seemed pretty insistent on the fact that it could,“ Steve said, looking back at the hologram. His eyes were calculating.
Peter put his hand up- er, down. “Mr Rogers, why do you keep calling the diablo an ‘it’?”
”Because we don’t know what it is,” Steve said. He sounded steady, but Clint picked up on his trigger finger tick.
Peter raised his eyebrows, “Isn’t that a bit, I don’t know, dehumanizing?”
”It might not be human,” Steve said defensively.
Peter furrowed his brows but didn’t say anything.
“Hold up Cap,” Tony said, pushing off from the table, “if you don’t think it's human, what do you think it is?”
Steve glanced away, “Well…”
Tony’s jaw dropped, “You don’t think it's the actual Devil, do you Steve?”
Steve was quiet, then rubbed a hand over his face “I know how this sounds…”
”Oh my God,” Tony laughed, a hand on his chest, “what are you, a grandma?”
”It makes sense!” Steve protested. He was gesticulating now, and Clint had to hold in a laugh.
Tony made a disappointed dad face, the same one he made at Peter sometimes, “The Devil, Steve? The Devil?”
”As opposed to what?” Steve said pointedly.
Tony threw his hands up, “Oh, I don’t know Steve, how about a mutant?”
Clint watched both of them closely. Tony and Steve were prone to argument, it was just part of the way they communicated. Typically it was all in good fun, and in a way this one was, but Tony kept staring at the hologram, eyes tracing the lines of the man's face, and every time someone had said Devil or Diablo he flinched. Clint knew Tony’s ticks, knew he was hiding something, but couldn’t tell what.
Steve huffed, “Sure, it's a possibility, but most mutants end up with the X-Men, why would this one not?”
“There are literally so many reasons why!”
”Alright,” Steve said, “what’s the mutation?”
Tony opened his mouth, then paused.
Steve raised his eyebrows.
Clint, having felt left out of the conversation, offered, “Night vision?”
Steve shook his head, “Night vision doesn’t make you able to fight 30 odd people.”
”You mean a pack, a half, and a handful?” Clint said with a smirk.
Steve just sighed.
Clint was happy to joke around again, but he glanced at the hologram and something in his stomach turned.
“So thermal,” Tony said, obviously following Clint's idea.
“Thermal wouldn’t work well in a crowded warehouse," Bruce said.
Tony ran a hand down his face, ”Okay, then sonar.”
“It reacted to things before they happened, not after,” Steve said.
Peter raised a tentative hand.
”Magic?”
Tony groaned and hit his head on the table, making the tools on it rattle.
”I’m not joking!” Peter insisted. “We know magic exists, we’ve met Doctor Strange, we know aliens exist,” he pointed at Thor, “and we know gods exist!”
”Technically also an alien,” Tony mumbled into the table.
”Not the point,” Peter said, making a shooing motion. Clint stifled another laugh. “If we know all of that is real, why do we draw the line here, why the Devil?”
”Because I would like it very much if Hell wasn’t real.” Tony said.
“A fair point,” Thor said, “Hel is most unpleasant.”
Steve stuttered, having watched his meeting unravel at the seams, “Well-”
“Uh,” Bruce interrupted, fiddling with the cuff of his shirt, “I could find out?”
Tony looked up and stared, “How?”
Bruce stood and walked up to one of the white boards and grabbed a marker, “Well,” he said, starting to sketch a rough drawing of the warehouse, “it- he was on the first floor, right? And Steve and Clint were on the top?” He looked at the two for confirmation.
”Yep,” Clint said. Clint remembered seeing the diablo, the way he moved through the swarm of bodies. He shuddered internally. Clint wasn’t sure what the diablo was, but the thing made his stomach turn.
And now here they were talking about him. Great.
”Then if we go back through the building,” Bruce continued, “we could see if we can find where he entered from. We take into account the floors,” Bruce crossed off the second floor/catwalk, “plus all the entrances that were guarded at the time,” a line through the truck bay and question marks by the side doors, “then we can find his ingress. If we find that, it's probably where he left the building, too.”
”And this helps because…?” Steve said.
“Now we have the spot most likely to have DNA matter.” Bruce's eyes lit up. “Hair, finger prints, skin flecks, and if he did get hit, blood or spit.”
Tony leapt to Bruce's side and grabbed him around the shoulders, “Bruce, I could kiss you right now.”
”Do it, coward!” Peter shouted.
Clint and Thor laughed while Steve covered a smile with his hand. Bruce was flustered but Tony just rolled his eyes and pressed a quick peck to the shorter man’s hair.
Clint and Peter cheered while Steve clapped politely. Bruce smiled, turning back to the board, while Tony started to flush at the attention.
“Very well done, Mr. Man of Iron,” Thor said in his usual roar, “but I have one last question for our man of science.”
Bruce nodded, back in his element. “Shoot.”
“What happens if we find no trace of the diablo? No blood, spit, anything?”
The light mood, brought on but the sudden affection between the two scientists, dispelled faster than bird song in the wind. Clint could feel his chest tightening, and started to fidget, fingerspelling random words absentmindedly.
Bruce swallowed and looked around the room, “Then Steve might just be right.”
Clint was starting to wish he had never gone on that mission more and more.
Bruce stared and the man in the hologram, “it might just be the Devil.”
~.~.~.~.~.~
”Matty,” Foggy said, voice filled with laughter, “Matty Matty Matty, please tell me you’re going to fuck with them.”
Matts grin was sly. You could almost call it devilish.